


in my dreams, i'm to blame

by sunshineeandsunflowers



Category: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
Genre: F/M, post Misses The Boat, pre Suburbs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-25
Updated: 2017-10-25
Packaged: 2019-01-23 05:15:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12499584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunshineeandsunflowers/pseuds/sunshineeandsunflowers
Summary: Charlie has night terrors, and Dee adjusts accordingly





	in my dreams, i'm to blame

Charlie has horrible night terrors; they only creep up every couple of months, but it is always a monsoon of emotion and a hurricane of thrashing limbs. Back in elementary school, Mac would sleep over when they got bad, and he’d sit up with Charlie all night to comfort him, showing up to the breakfast table with matching undereye circles. Frank usually just pushes Charlie over back on his own side of the pull-out couch. 

As soon as he starts fooling around with Dee, Charlie dreads the next nightmare; he’d never admit it to anyone but her (and even then, only rarely and after many drinks), but he likes being in Dee’s company. Her apartment smells like cheap detergent, and her hair feels really soft on his neck when they sleep close together. He’s pretty sure that by waking her up in the middle of the night with the sound of his terrified screams and defensive kicking around might alter this, just a bit. So he avoids staying the night for as long as possible. He comes up with various excuses from the reasonable (Dee, what if Frank notices? We can’t have that) to the downright ridiculous (those cats out there can’t sleep unless they know I am safe in bed; I have a duty to all eighty of them, Dee!) 

Dee does not take kindly to this.  
She feels like he’s ashamed of what they’re doing, and she doesn’t necessarily blame him, she just wishes that she was the one who kept leaving him in bed alone at night, rather than the other way around. She was so used to having complete control in her various, short-winded relationships, and feeling like she had lost any of that dominance, frankly, pissed her off. But, as time goes on, Charlie begins to fall into a comfortable routine with Dee; they close down the bar together while Mac and Dennis go off without them and Frank is god-knows where, then they go back to her apartment. They’ll usually fool around a little, almost like they’re teenagers again (only without the cruel nicknames and bulky back brace), before they fall asleep in some pile of layered limbs that doesn’t look like it should be as comfortable as it is. 

Six months into whatever they’re doing, Charlie wakes Dee up at 4:30 in the morning by whacking her in the face with his forearm; shaken and half-asleep Dee attempts to yell at him before noticing that he’s not even fully conscious. He looks younger than she’s seen him in almost twenty years, with the fear of a young boy splayed across his face that even his beard could not hide. This is not something that Dee is equipped to handle; she did not sign up for nightmares, she signed up for good sex and poor communication. She gets the urge to just kick him off the bed to wake him up, something she would have done to any of the others. Another glance at his face, so soft and yet so fearful, changes her mind. She dodges another flying limb and wraps an arm loosely around his waist, rubbing his back to try and subtly calm whatever is happening in his head. After twenty minutes, it’s nearing five a.m. and Charlie has started to calm down. Dee lets herself fall asleep as soon as his faces relaxes. 

She does not say a word about this in the morning. He wakes up after her, sometime after noon, with that unsettled feeling he always has after a bad night’s sleep. He expects some kind of jab from her, and is surprised when he just hears her call, “Good morning” from the bathroom. She plops next to him on the bed.  
“Get some real clothes on, we’re going to breakfast.”

Relieved, he puts on his jeans from the day before and heads down to the diner with Dee. He feels a sort of warmth creep into his chest, knowing that she still wants to do whatever they’re doing despite his sleeping habits. They go to breakfast and Dee order Charlie pancakes, hash browns, and large cup of coffee; she makes sure he eats all of it and lets him tell her about something he and Frank found in the sewers the other day. Neither of them bring up the faint bruise on Dee's left cheek or the tired look in her eyes. Every couple of months, Charlie wakes up unsettled and craving pancakes; Dee doesn’t seem to mind at all.

**Author's Note:**

> hello! this is my first fic in a LONG time, and it's my first iasip fic so this should be interesting. I took the title from that Bleachers' song "Don't Take the Money" and I got the general idea from a headcanon submitted to jchnmulany on tumblr, so all the love there


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